SB 17 Seeks to Govern CTE Education

For Linn County’s voice in the Missouri Senate, a recent piece of legislation seeks to help Career and Technical Education students. Senator Brian Munzlinger (R) introduced Senate Bill 17 (SB 17), which will see discussion this Monday in committee in the Senate. This Bill seeks to form a Career and Technical Education (CTE) Board, which will work under DESE to govern CTE.

For Linn County’s voice in the Missouri Senate, a recent piece of legislation seeks to help Career and Technical Education students. Senator Brian Munzlinger (R) introduced Senate Bill 17 (SB 17), which will see discussion this Monday in committee in the Senate. This Bill seeks to form a Career and Technical Education (CTE) Board, which will work under DESE to govern CTE.

“This all goes back four years when I got complaints in my office about how Career and Technical was being treated by DESE,” said Senator Munzlinger. “The complaints got worse and more frequent. My staff and I looked at ways we can help.”

Sen. Munzlinger continued: “I filed the bill and found out that Oklahoma and Texas have program like this that work. When we started looking at DESE, some programs are outdated, the titles have not kept up with technology, but the CTE schools have.”

This legislation was formulated with input from one of the nation’s largest manufacturers. “I met with Boeing, one of Missouri’s largest employers,” said Sen. Munzlinger. “They told me that they can get all the people with four-year degrees they need, but they need people with some skills.”

Career and Technical Education is the stock and trade of the Linn County Area Career and Technical Center. The formation of a governing board for CTE could surely affect the way the LCACTC works.

“The idea of a Career and Technology Education advisory board is not new and was in place in Missouri from the 1970’s through the 1990’s,” said LCACTC Director Carey Smith. “The bill has just been introduced, and there are many questions to be answered. As a career center director, I am carefully following the bill and am anxious to see how things go in this legislative session.”

Smith continued: “With or without the legislation, the number one priority of the Linn County Area Career and Technical Center is to continually work to fulfill our mission of ‘partnering and educating all generations of our community for tomorrow’s challenges.‘“